Petrucha (The Rule of Won
) offers a reality-bending take on the idea of split personalities. After the death of Wade’s mother in the prologue, the story jumps ahead three years and unfolds in alternating chapters, both narrated by Wade but in two very different realities. In one, the high school senior is a Type-A aspiring scientist, anxious to prove a theory that modifications to the town’s particle collider are a potentially deadly threat; in the other, the particle collider has been closed down and Wade is a selfish, guitar-playing dropout, who gets involved with some dangerous mobsters. Which universe and which Wade are real (if the answer is even one or the other) gets murkier as reality shifts, culminating in a meeting of the two Wades, but there are enough textual and visual cues (different fonts for each Wade, among other elements) that will allow readers to follow. Though both story lines and the dialogue lean toward the melodramatic, Petrucha’s story should leave readers considering the power of fate versus choice and the internal urges and desires that regularly jostle for control. Ages 14–up. (Mar.)
